


Employment Negotiations

by westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Episode: s03e02 Manchester Part II, F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-09
Updated: 2008-09-09
Packaged: 2019-05-15 04:10:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14783342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist/pseuds/westwingfanfictioncentral_archivist
Summary: Manchester 2, Josh gets sidetracked before he gets in the shower.





	Employment Negotiations

**Author's Note:**

> A copy of this work was once archived at National Library, a part of the [ West Wing Fanfiction Central](https://fanlore.org/wiki/West_Wing_Fanfiction_Central), a West Wing fanfiction archive. More information about the Open Doors approved archive move can be found in the [announcement post](http://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/8325).

  
Author's notes: This is another ficlet in a challenge series, which is something of a missed moments series. The challenge is that Josh and Donna's "moment" could have pretty much come after any one of their conversations. The beginning dialog is the scene from the episode that the challenge was to springboard off of.  


* * *

JOSH: Come in.  
DONNA: You're supposed to be downstairs.  
JOSH: Yeah.  
DONNA: You're not ready yet?   
JOSH: We're blowing this RU-486 thing!  
DONNA: You've got to get in the shower!  
JOSH: Among everything else, it's going to look like we're kicking off the campaign by pandering to women's groups.  
DONNA: Josh--  
JOSH: Yeah, no question about it, most voters are pro-choice, but the ones that aren't are going to devote their lives and their money to beating you. Guns don't kill people--Bartlet does. It's going to look like we screwed up the timing so the press is going to write about process and not about issues, and getting political reporters to write about issues in the first place is like getting kids to eat their vegetables.  
DONNA: You've got to shave.   
JOSH: Don't you want to find out how it's like getting kids to eat their vegetables?   
DONNA: Shave and shower.   
JOSH: It helps if there's nothing else on their plate.  
DONNA: You couldn't sleep?   
JOSH: No. I could stop this thing. One phone call--the President's not even involved! "Could you do us a favour? Could you hold off two weeks? We love your drug, but we don't want it folded into our news cycle!" I could have picked up the phone! I could have picked up the phone, I--  
DONNA: Josh--  
JOSH: (slams his hand against the wall) God!  
DONNA: What's this about?  
JOSH: (beat) I blew the tobacco thing. I could have helped us, I was ... (beat) It's going to be a very close election. (beat) I've got to take a shower. 

 

"Josh?"

I hear her voice before I can close the bathroom door. It's small and unsure. When I turn back to her, she looks very worried. I've seen this look from her before. She looked at me this way right before I handed her my i.d. badge the day she hired herself, like she was terrified of what she may have to do if I didn't let her stay. She's looking at me that way again, like she's terrified of what's going to happen if we don't win.

"What do you mean it's going to be close?" she asks softly.

I lean up against the doorway and look at her. "These amateur screw ups." I shrug. "I'm not the only one making them. We have so much to overcome in this election, Donna..."

"We HAVE to win, Josh." she says adamantly. "This is what I know. This job, this team of people. What am I going to DO if we don't win, Josh? Where do you go after you've been senior assistant to the Deputy Chief of Staff? I don't even know what I'm qualified to do."

"You come with me." I say immediately. Both our eyes go wide as soon as the words are out of my mouth. But as soon as I said it, I meant it. 

"Don't give me an empty job offer." she says and turns away. I push myself off the door jam and walk a bit over to her. 

"It's not empty." 

And we both know it's not actually a job offer. I'd like to introduce you all to the 500 pound gorilla sitting in the chair I just vacated. 

She turns around and looks at me, expecting me to elaborate. "What would you do?"

"Work for the DNC, work for a congressman, teach, be a lawyer."

"That's not funny." 

"I'm just saying I can get a job."

"They don't usually let you bring your own assistant, Josh." she says as she pulls my suitcase up off the floor and puts it on the chair.

"Yeah, I don't think I'm talking about assistant." My mouth is just running away with me at this point. She and I have been dancing around this thing for too long. I'm tired of dating women like Mandy who are mean to me just for sport, who would just as soon as sell you out for the next guy with more power than stand by you. Donna's not like that.

Donna's a nurturer. I'm not sure when I fell in love with her, but somewhere in the last few crazy years, I did. Probably during one of our late night movie sessions when I was stuck at home recovering and didn't want her to leave me alone at night, so instead, we watched Turner Classic Movies all night and she fell asleep on my shoulder exhausted, just so I wouldn't have be alone.

"What?" 

"I didn't really know it until I just said it now, Donna," I say walking slowly over to her. "but I don't mean as my assistant." 

"Then as what?" 

Here goes nothing. Please let her not slap me.

I lean in and kiss her. It takes her a moment I think to get over the shock, but then her lips start to move under mine and the taste of her is like nothing I've ever tasted before, like a fine wine, but better than that. 

Her fingers are dancing along my pecs and the kiss gets deeper. I don't think she's going slap me. Quite the contrary in fact, she gives me a little nudge and we start walking backward to the bed. The back of my knees hit the mattress and we tumble back together. She's on top of me, but I roll us over and in doing so, set my attention to her neck. 

I may not have known for years what I've felt for her, but I've wanted to kiss this neck since I first laid eyes on it. She groans and tips her head back. 

"And if we lose?" she asks as I move to her collarbone. 

"I don't know, but I'm not not doing this, so we'll have to figure something out." I mumble against her soft skin.

"Good plan." 

My eyes catch sight of the clock and I groan for an entirely different reason. "Why oh why can this not be happening when I don't have to go downstairs and face the leader of the free world with an erection?" I groan and she giggles, but her breasts move against me when she does that. "That doesn't help, Donna." 

She pushes up against me and I reluctantly move off of her. "Go take a cold shower." she says in a VERY husky voice. "I'll go downstairs and make something up." 

"Find a hole for us in the schedule." I squeak just as she gets to the door.

"For?" she gives me a brilliant smile when she turns back around. 

"Some more of this." I say gesturing between us.

"To talk about my future with you?"

"Yeah." 

She smiles and leaves the room, closing the door behind her. I look at the door for a moment. She probably meant talk about what we'd do professionally because I can tell she's really nervous about it, but that's not what I mean at all.

THE END


End file.
